William C. Nierman, PhD

Related

wnierman

You are here

Bio

William Nierman, PhD, has studied microbial genomics since joining the faculty of The Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR) in 1998. Dr. Nierman has served in the roles of Project Director and/or Principal Investigator for the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) genomics centers at JCVI since the inception of this program by NIAID. He served as Principal Investigator in a Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation funded study on the respiratory tract microbiome and the role of the pneumonia vaccine in very young infants. He directed the international project that determined the first genome sequence of Aspergillus fumigatus, the fungal pathogen that causes the frequently lethal infection, invasive aspergillosis. He also directed the project that determined the first genomic sequence of the then newly recognized biothreat pathogen, Burkholderia mallei. His laboratory is currently engaged in the study of the genomic mechanisms of antibiotic tolerance and resistance in the biothreat pathogen Burkholderia pseudomallei. Dr. Nierman is an author of more that 140 peer reviewed scientific papers. Over 64 of these papers reported studies on the genomics of microbial pathogens since 2008.

Research Priorities

Studies of bacterial pathogen resistance and tolerance to antibacterial drugs

Studies of antibiotic tolerance and persisters in Burkholderia pseudomallei and Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Efficient high throughput screening for novel antibacterial drugs

The respiratory tract microbiome in health and disease

The respiratory tract microbiome and pneumonia in lung transplant patients

The respiratory tract microbiome in the first two years of life

The respiratory tract microbiome in cases of severe pneumonia

Fungal pathogens

Expression profiling of fungi and the mammalian host during in vivo infections and ex vivo infections of culture immune system cells